Geography Mixed Quiz: Set 13

The correct answer is A, Mercury. Mercury is a terrestrial planet, not a Jovian one. The eight planets fall into two groups. The four inner planets, Mercury, Venus, Earth and Mars, are called terrestrial or rocky planets: they are small, dense, have solid crusts and few or no moons. The four outer planets, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus and Neptune, are the Jovian or giant planets, named after Jupiter, whose Roman name is Jove. They are far larger, made mostly of hydrogen and helium, have low density, ring systems and many moons. Saturn is so light that it would float on water. Mercury is also the smallest planet and the one closest to the Sun. Option B is wrong because Neptune is the outermost Jovian planet. Option C is wrong because Jupiter is the largest Jovian planet and the group is named after it. Option D is wrong because Saturn, with its bright rings, is a Jovian planet too. Exam tip: four rocky inner planets, four gas giants outside, with the asteroid belt between Mars and Jupiter.

The correct answer is A, Zanskar Range. Zoji La, or the Zojila pass, lies in the Zanskar range of the Himalayas at a height of about 3,528 metres. It is on the Srinagar to Leh highway between Sonamarg in the Kashmir valley and Drass in the Kargil district, and it is the gateway to Ladakh. Heavy snow closes it in winter, which is why the Zojila tunnel is being built to keep the route open through the year and give the armed forces year-round access to Ladakh. Option B is wrong because the Ladakh range holds the Khardung La and Chang La passes. Option C is wrong because the eastern Karakoram range holds the Karakoram pass and Saser La on the old trade route to Central Asia. Option D is wrong because the Dhauladhar range runs through Himachal Pradesh above Dharamshala and Kangra. Exam tip: Zoji La in the Zanskar range for Kashmir to Ladakh, Khardung La in the Ladakh range beyond Leh.

The correct answer is D, Intrusive igneous rocks. Granite forms when magma cools slowly deep inside the crust, so it is an intrusive, or plutonic, igneous rock. The slow cooling lets large crystals of quartz, feldspar and mica grow, which is why granite has a coarse, grainy look you can see with the naked eye. It is hard, weather-resistant and takes a fine polish, so it is used for temple floors, kitchen counters and monuments; India is one of the world's largest exporters of granite. Rocks such as gabbro and dolerite belong to the same intrusive family. Option A is wrong because extrusive rocks form when lava cools quickly at the surface, giving fine-grained rocks like basalt, the rock of the Deccan Traps. Option B is wrong because sedimentary rocks such as sandstone and limestone are built from deposited layers. Option C is wrong because metamorphic rocks are older rocks changed by heat and pressure; granite itself turns into gneiss. Exam tip: granite intrusive, basalt extrusive, granite to gneiss, limestone to marble.

The correct answer is A, Dang. Dang is not a South Indian tribe. The name belongs to the Dangs district of southern Gujarat, whose tribal people are mainly Bhil, Warli and Konkana, all of western India. The other three are communities of the Nilgiri hills, where Tamil Nadu, Kerala and Karnataka meet. The Toda are pastoralists known for their barrel-shaped huts and their buffalo-centred rituals. The Badaga are farmers of the Nilgiri plateau who speak a tongue close to Kannada. The Irula, a Scheduled Tribe of Tamil Nadu, are known for snake catching and for collecting forest produce. Option B is wrong because the Toda are the best known tribe of the Nilgiris. Option C is wrong because the Badaga live on the same plateau, around Udhagamandalam. Option D is wrong because the Irula are spread across Tamil Nadu and Kerala. Exam tip: remember Toda, Kota, Kurumba, Badaga and Irula as the five main Nilgiri tribes, and place Bhil, Warli and the Dangs in Gujarat and Maharashtra.

The correct answer is C, Focus. The focus, also called the hypocentre, is the point below the surface at which the strained rock ruptures and releases its stored elastic energy as seismic waves. Its depth decides how widely the shock is felt: shallow-focus earthquakes are more damaging near the source than deep-focus ones of the same magnitude.

Option A, the epicentre, is the point on the ground surface lying vertically above the focus, so it is a surface point and not the place of origin. Option B, a fault line, is the fracture in the crust along which the blocks move; the focus lies on a fault but the fault itself is a line or plane, not a point. Option D, the shadow zone, is the belt on the far side of the earth, between about 103 and 142 degrees, which receives no direct P or S waves. The pair focus and epicentre is the most frequently asked distinction in this chapter.

The correct answer is D, Sikkim. Sikkim does not touch Myanmar. Its neighbours across the border are Nepal to the west, China in the north and east, and Bhutan to the south-east. Only four Indian states share the border with Myanmar - Arunachal Pradesh, Nagaland, Manipur and Mizoram - and that border runs for about 1,643 km. Option A is wrong because Arunachal Pradesh meets Myanmar along its south-eastern edge. Option B is wrong because Mizoram has a long stretch of the Myanmar border besides its border with Bangladesh. Option C is wrong because Manipur meets Myanmar on the east, and Moreh in Manipur is the main trading town on that border. Sikkim is India's least populated state and shares borders with three countries, but Myanmar is not one of them. Exam tip: remember the Myanmar border states as A-N-M-M - Arunachal Pradesh, Nagaland, Manipur and Mizoram.

The correct answer is A, about 6.5 degrees Celsius per kilometre. This is the average rate at which air temperature falls as one rises through the troposphere, and it explains why hill stations are cooler than the plains and why high peaks carry snow even in the tropics.

Option B is far too small and would leave the top of the troposphere warmer than it is. Option C is close to the dry adiabatic rate at which a parcel of rising air cools by expansion, which is a different idea from the lapse rate of the still atmosphere and is the commonest trap here. Option D is the same figure as the correct one with the decimal point moved, a deliberate distractor; note also that the lapse rate is an average, and on a cold clear night an inversion can make temperature rise with height near the ground.

The correct answer is D, Tide. A tide is the regular rise and fall of sea level caused by the gravitational pull of the Moon and, to a smaller extent, the Sun, together with the centrifugal force of the spinning earth. Most coasts get two high tides and two low tides in about 24 hours and 52 minutes. When the Sun, Moon and Earth line up at new moon and full moon, the pulls add up and give the high spring tides; when the Sun and Moon are at right angles in the first and third quarters, the pulls work against each other and give the low neap tides. Tides help ships enter ports and are used for tidal power. Option A is wrong because waves are made by wind blowing over the surface. Option B is wrong because a tsunami is a single train of huge waves set off by an undersea earthquake or landslide. Option C is wrong because currents are steady horizontal flows of water such as the Gulf Stream. Exam tip: spring tides at full and new moon, neap tides in the quarters.

The correct answer is B, Kalbaisakhi. Kalbaisakhi is the name given in West Bengal to the violent evening thunderstorms of the hot weather season, from March to May. The word means the calamity of the month of Baisakh, because the squalls arrive with strong winds, thunder and sudden heavy rain that can flatten crops and huts. They help the jute and rice nurseries and bring brief relief from the heat. The same storms are called Bardoli Chheerha in Assam and Norwesters in English, since they blow in from the north-west. Option A is wrong because the Loo is the hot, dry wind that blows over north-western India in the afternoons of May and June. Option C is wrong because the retreating monsoon is the withdrawal of the south-west monsoon from October onwards. Option D is wrong because mango showers are the pre-monsoon rains of Kerala and coastal Karnataka that help the mango crop ripen. Exam tip: Kalbaisakhi in Bengal, Bardoli Chheerha in Assam, mango showers in Kerala and the Loo in the north-west.

The correct answer is C, Silchar to Porbandar. The East-West Corridor is one arm of the National Highways Development Project, planned together with the North-South Corridor from Srinagar to Kanyakumari. It runs for about 3,300 km from Porbandar on the Saurashtra coast of Gujarat, through Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh, Uttar Pradesh, Bihar and West Bengal, and across the narrow Siliguri corridor into Assam, ending at Silchar in the Barak valley. The two corridors cross at Jhansi in Uttar Pradesh, a point that exams love to ask. In Rajasthan the route passes Udaipur, Chittorgarh and Kota, so it matters for Rajasthan papers too. Option A is wrong because neither Imphal nor Ahmedabad is an end point of the corridor. Option B is wrong because Dimapur and Vadodara are not its terminal cities. Option D is wrong because the corridor does not end at Kandla, a port on the Gulf of Kutch; its western end is Porbandar. Exam tip: North-South = Srinagar to Kanyakumari; East-West = Silchar to Porbandar; they meet at Jhansi.

The correct answer is B, Gerusoppa. The Sharavati river in Karnataka falls from a height of about 253 metres as Jog Falls, which is also called Gerusoppa Falls after the village nearby, and Jogada Gundi in the local tongue. It is among the highest plunge waterfalls in India, and the water comes down in four separate streams named Raja, Rani, Roarer and Rocket. The Linganamakki dam upstream now controls the flow, so the falls are at their finest during the monsoon. Option A is wrong because Hogenakkal is on the Kaveri in Tamil Nadu, close to the Karnataka border. Option C is wrong because Soochipara, or Sentinel Rock falls, is on the Chaliyar in Wayanad, Kerala. Option D is wrong because Athirappilly is on the Chalakudy river in Kerala and is called the Niagara of India. Exam tip: the Sharavati makes Jog or Gerusoppa Falls in Karnataka, while the Kaveri makes Hogenakkal and Shivanasamudra.

The correct answer is B, Nagaland. In the 2011 Census, Nagaland was the only state whose population actually fell, with a decadal growth rate of about minus 0.6 per cent for 2001–2011, the lowest in India. Experts linked the fall mainly to the correction of an inflated count in 2001, when Nagaland had shown one of the fastest growth rates in the country. For India as a whole, decadal growth was 17.7 per cent, down from 21.5 per cent in 1991–2001, and among states Meghalaya grew the fastest, at about 27.9 per cent. Option A is wrong because Arunachal Pradesh grew by about 26 per cent, well above the national average. Option C is wrong because Madhya Pradesh grew by about 20.3 per cent. Option D is wrong because Punjab grew by about 13.9 per cent, which is low but still positive. Exam tip: Census 2011 decadal growth, lowest Nagaland (negative), highest state Meghalaya, India 17.7 per cent.

The correct answer is C, Mexico. Milpa is the name given to shifting cultivation in Mexico and in the neighbouring parts of Central America, where maize, beans and squash are grown together on a patch cleared from the forest. In shifting cultivation a plot is cleared by cutting and burning the trees, cropped for two or three years until the ash-fed soil loses its fertility, and then left fallow while the farmer moves to a fresh patch. Because the same practice grew up in forest belts across the world, it carries a different local name in each region. A is wrong because in India it is called jhum in the north-east, podu in Andhra Pradesh and bewar or dahiya in Madhya Pradesh. B is wrong because in Malaysia and Indonesia it is known as ladang. D is wrong because in Brazil it is called roca or coivara. Exam tip: milpa in Mexico, ladang in Malaysia, roca in Brazil, chena in Sri Lanka and jhum in north-east India.

The correct answer is A, Andhra Pradesh. Andhra Pradesh lies on the east coast of India, so its shoreline faces the Bay of Bengal. Its coast runs from the border of Odisha in the north to Tamil Nadu in the south, and the Godavari and Krishna rivers build rich deltas on it before entering the sea. The states with a coast on the Bay of Bengal are West Bengal, Odisha, Andhra Pradesh and Tamil Nadu, along with the union territories of Puducherry and the Andaman and Nicobar Islands. The stretch of the east coast in Andhra Pradesh is often called the Northern Circars, while the southern part in Tamil Nadu is the Coromandel Coast. B is wrong because Karnataka lies on the west coast and faces the Arabian Sea. C is wrong because Kerala also has its coast on the Arabian Sea, not the Bay of Bengal. D is wrong because Telangana is a landlocked state with no coastline at all. Exam tip: east coast states from north to south, West Bengal, Odisha, Andhra Pradesh, Tamil Nadu; Telangana has no sea coast.

The correct answer is C, Hiralal Chaudhuri. Hiralal Chaudhuri is called the father of the Blue Revolution, the sharp rise in India's fish production. Working as a fishery scientist, he achieved induced breeding of carp by hormone injection in 1957, a method that freed fish farmers from depending on wild seed collected from rivers and allowed hatcheries to supply fingerlings in large numbers. Aquaculture grew from there, and India is today among the largest fish producers in the world. Option A is wrong because Verghese Kurien led the White Revolution in milk, building the Amul model and Operation Flood. Option B is wrong because Sam Pitroda is linked with the telecom revolution and the spread of public call offices. Option D is wrong because M.S. Swaminathan is the father of the Green Revolution in wheat and rice. Exam tip: learn the colour revolutions together, Green for food grains, White for milk, Blue for fish, Yellow for oilseeds, Pink for prawns and Golden for horticulture.

The correct answer is C, Panama Canal. The Panama Canal cuts across the narrow Isthmus of Panama in Central America and joins the Atlantic Ocean, through the Caribbean Sea, with the Pacific Ocean. It was opened in 1914 by the United States and is about 82 km long. Because the land in between is higher than the sea, ships are raised and lowered by locks that use water from the man-made Gatun Lake. The canal saves ships the long voyage around Cape Horn at the southern tip of South America. The USA handed the canal over to Panama on 31 December 1999. A is wrong because the Kiel Canal in Germany joins the North Sea and the Baltic Sea. B is wrong because the Suez Canal in Egypt, opened in 1869, joins the Mediterranean Sea and the Red Sea. D is wrong because the White Sea Canal in Russia links the White Sea with the Baltic Sea. Exam tip: Suez 1869 (Mediterranean to Red Sea, no locks), Panama 1914 (Atlantic to Pacific, with locks), Kiel (North Sea to Baltic Sea).

The correct answer is D, Saturn. Saturn lies beyond the asteroid belt, so it is an outer planet. The eight planets are divided by the asteroid belt that runs between Mars and Jupiter. The four inner planets, Mercury, Venus, Earth and Mars, are small, rocky and dense, with solid crusts and few or no moons; they are called terrestrial planets. The four outer planets, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus and Neptune, are huge balls of hydrogen and helium with low density, ring systems and many moons; they are called Jovian or gas giant planets. Saturn is the second largest planet and its bright rings make it the easiest to recognise. Option A is wrong because Venus is the second planet from the Sun and an inner planet. Option B is wrong because Earth is the third planet and also an inner one. Option C is wrong because Mercury is the smallest planet and the closest to the Sun. Exam tip: four rocky planets inside the asteroid belt, four gas giants outside it.

The correct answer is B, sedimentary rock. Sandstone forms when grains of sand carried by rivers, wind or waves settle in layers and are cemented together over long periods, which makes it a sedimentary rock. Rocks are of three kinds. Igneous rocks form from cooling magma or lava, sedimentary rocks from the deposition and compaction of sediments, and metamorphic rocks when heat and pressure change an existing rock. Sedimentary rocks often show layers and may hold fossils, and coal and limestone belong to this group. Under heat and pressure sandstone turns into quartzite, limestone into marble and shale into slate. Option A is wrong because non-foliated is a description of texture used for metamorphic rocks such as marble and quartzite, not a class of its own. Option C is wrong because basalt and granite are igneous rocks. Option D is wrong because slate, marble and gneiss are metamorphic rocks. Exam tip: sandstone becomes quartzite, limestone becomes marble, shale becomes slate and granite becomes gneiss.

The correct answer is B, magnitude of energy released by an earthquake. The Richter scale, devised by Charles F. Richter in 1935, expresses the energy released at the source of the shock. It is logarithmic and open-ended, so each whole number means about ten times the wave amplitude and roughly thirty-two times the energy of the number below it, and a single earthquake has only one magnitude value.

Option A describes the modified Mercalli scale, which grades the shaking and damage actually felt at a place in twelve degrees from I to XII, and which gives many values for the same earthquake. Option C, the depth of the focus, is worked out from the arrival times of P and S waves at several stations and is not what any named scale reports. Option D, the height of tsunami waves, is measured directly by tide gauges and ocean buoys. Keep the pair fixed: Richter for magnitude, Mercalli for intensity.

The correct answer is B, the mesosphere. Although the air there is thin, it is dense enough to heat a body moving at cosmic speed by friction, so most meteors glow and are destroyed in this layer and are seen from the ground as shooting stars. The mesosphere also contains the coldest point of the atmosphere, the mesopause, at its top.

Option A, the stratosphere, lies below the mesosphere; by the time a meteor reaches that height it has usually burnt out. Option C, the thermosphere, lies above it and is so thin that although individual molecules are very energetic, there is not enough air to destroy an incoming body. Option D, the exosphere, is the outermost fringe where the atmosphere merges into space and where satellites orbit with almost no resistance.